The Magic of Sigils

The efficacy of sigils is half psychological and half magical, which makes it doubly practical and efficient, as far as I’m concerned. Modern advertising, both in person and online, uses the same tenets of psychology that sigils do. Several magical traditions from around the world, from the most ceremonial to the most tribal, also employ these cornerstones to great effect.

Not only can you encapsulate a desire or goal into a single glyph – which can then employ colors, background patterns and shapes to enhance its impact upon your psyche and spirit – but you can flock them together. In much the same way as a single fish can lead an entire school, a particularly confident sigil can pave the way for less certain sigils to become successful. In other words, if you create a sigil for something that’s already succeeded, it helps increase other, newer sigils’ likelihood for success. A wolf pack is much more efficient at hunting than a lone wolf, after all.

For a more detailed overview of sigil magic, I highly recommend Rune Soup’s Ultimate Sigil Magic Guide.

The Sigil Process

Step One: Choose a goal/intention/quality you wish to invoke. This can be anything positive, from “I want my pets to be healthy” to “I want to be successful at work” to “I want to open myself to new love” to “I want the discipline to finish my novel.” If you can make a sentence that begins with “I want” and does not include any negativity – no wishing others bad luck! – then I can make a sigil for it.

Step Two: Burn off the dross from your words. Narrow down your “I want” sentence to two or three words; boil it down to its absolute, precise, accurate essence. Keep any verbs in the first person and present tense. Make sure you consider all the ways this phrase could manifest, and make sure all those ways are positive and desirable to you. If they aren’t, then rephrase. I am more than happy to help you with this step! Word-magic is my thing. :)

Step Three: Think of any colors or symbols you associate with your phrase and your goal. Let me know what those are, along with your phrase.

Step Four: I write down your phrase. I cut from it all vowels and all duplicate consonants, rendering it tightly-packed and condensed. I write it out in Kalash, Uhjayi, or English letters; I’ll use Kalash by default, but you can request any of the three.

Step Five: I arrange the remaining letters in an artistic fashion that is both pleasing to the eye and also evocative of the phrase itself, fitting well within the background of color and symbol that I’ll build around it.

Step Six: I paint! Then I photograph the painting and write up all the symbolism I’ve used, from color to line to composition.

Step Seven: Enchantment. Depending on the sigil, I’ll perform a small ritual to imbue it with potency and clarify its intention, and/or I’ll make offerings to appropriate spirits and/or deities (always with your permission!) for their help and blessings.

Step Eight: I send the sigil to you. With it is a small piece of word-magic, a few phrases for you to read aloud when you get the sigil; these words activate the sigil and start it working for you. You can place the sigil anywhere you’d like, at home or work; I recommend somewhere it can be seen frequently but won’t be hit by direct sunlight or a lot of dust/dirt.

Step Nine: Enjoy!